Discussions on politics and other topics of interest in the Town of New Hartford, N.Y.

Friday, September 5, 2008

Open wide and say Ahh...

This won't hurt a bit...

New Hartford Director of Economic Development Dan Gilligan, several elected officials, NHCS Superintendent Dan Gilligan, Mark Nordland of Ryan Companies and Larry Adler gathered for an "emergency meeting" at the Dept. of Transportation Conference Room on September 4, 2008. Cathy Lawrence and Ed Wiatr from Concerned Citizens also attended the meeting and audio-recorded it so everyone could hear the discussion.The message from NHCS Superintendent Dan Gilligan, or was it Director of Economic Development Dan Gilligan..hmmm...anyway, he said this will not cost you a dime...your school, county and town tax dollars will pay to build the 4 new roads for a private developer in the New Hartford Business Park and the 840 intersection...and the Woods Highway improvements...and...and...

Don't worry though, it's only for the next 15 years. Larry Adler also assured everyone that he is a stakeholder...he owns a lot of land that he will be paying taxes on. (Course, those taxes will be going to build those improvements for his own land.) It sort of equates to a taxpayer using their town, school and county taxes over the next fifteen years to fix up their own home.

Listen to them do the two-step when Concerned Citizens asks them if there are any signed agreements.

Concerned Citizens also asked "if everything is such a go, how come the Tax Increment Financing agreement isn't signed yet?

Of course, Dan Gilligan, Director of Economic Development for the Town of New Hartford, had the answer...he said that it is because the dollar amounts keep changing...we first have to know the borrowing amount... Hmmm, the town has already approved a $2.9 Bond Anticipation Note and now they are talking another $3 million for the intersection...

Like we said people, open wide...

Ahh...to be a politician...they make it all sound so "wonderful", don't they?

We encourage you to listen to the audio-recording. There is so much double-talk that not only Town of New Hartford residents should be outraged, every resident in Oneida County should be screaming!

For clarification:

Mark Nordland represents Ryan Companies, the owner of The Hartford building. The Hartford will be leasing the building from Ryan Companies.

Larry Adler, Cameron, LLC is the developer of the Business Park and owns the land.

8 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Correct me if I am wrong but didn't Pyramid pay for access or repairs to the State roads on some or all of the properties in the Town. They as developers I believe have paid out of their own pockets millions of dollars.

What happens if the developer or Ryan go bankrupt. Who is guaranteeing this bond a private developer/builder or a financial institution.

Just questions that could have been answered before. Where was the rest of the Town Board.

Concerned Citizens actually had a meeting with Dept. of Transportation personnel. We were told that they have never worked with a town building a road before...it is usually the developer they work with.

We know from attending town board meetings that the developer constructs and pays for all roads that are built for the development. The roads have to be built according to town specifications. When the development is done, the developer pays for testing to make sure that town specs are followed prior to the town accepting the road.

The town can say what they want about the Letter of Credit that Larry Adler has supposedly given them. It is our understanding that the town is on the hook for any unpaid bond money. Tax Increment Financing (TIF) bonds are generally harder to "sell" than other types of bonds and the rate is usually higher. How difficult do you think it would be to sell bonds when the town states they have no liabilty but they have a $140,000 Letter of Credit for a $6 million dollar bond (or more)?

This whole "deal" stinks to high heaven.

Concerned Citizens urges everyone to attend any public meeting that is held regarding this project; whether you live in New Hartford or not. Everyone in Oneida County is a stakeholder in this "behind closed doors deal".

I would like to know how many accidents have occurred at the 3 lights that are already on 840..A possible soulition might be to use the already there left turn lane at Clark Mills rd and allow a u-turn as they do in Florida, it works very well and then just put an exit on into the park ..might be cheaper than another intersection...I think Pyramid had to be sued to get them to fix the roads they had agreed to.

You know that "U Turm" idea is not a bad option. They are all over Syracuse and I have used them as well in Florida. Double left lane with the outer lane for left turns and inner for the "U". Brilliant thought.

Thank you for making the audio track available for review by the general public. It was most informative as well as eye awaking. The entitlement attitude of some of our elected officials – who are entrusted to legally look out of the public interest – is significantly disingenuous.

The first of several unbelievable act of arrogance was when the Assemblyman pontificated his rendition of his involvement with other local governments and New York State Departments to “bend the rules” to make concessions in the Western part of Oneida County because “we create jobs.” Was he saying that he has joined these other participants in illegal actions of skirting the law when engaging in other economic development projects? The Assemblyman interpreted the sanctioning of these actions by gauging the opposition, or lack of which, of the local news media. They, the Assemblyman, the other local governments, the news media, and NY State DOT, all apparently feel that, if the project creates jobs that “. . . dam it! let’s do it . . .” This admission of guilt should, at least trigger an investigation to determine if there is enough evidence to launch a possible Grand Jury indictment.

The Assemblyman appeared to be most uninformed in terms of stating that this project was going to generate new school taxes. The Assemblyman stated that he does not really care which town any project could be in because they will have to abide by the same rules that the taxpayer must abide by. But in all actuality, the New Hartford property in question does not generate the complete school taxes per se. It does not requirement the tax remittance of the same taxes that are levied on the private taxpayer. The project will actually pay a fee in lieu of taxes that will be substantially less that the full assessed tax value that the project should generate.

Another incredible exchange happened between the New Hartford Town Supervisor and the members of Concerned Citizens for Honest and Open Government. The Town Supervisor’s behavior was shameful, particularly in the presence of all of the other participants of this meeting. His confrontational outburst quickly reverted to his name calling when he was asked some simple questions that should not have generated any anxiety on his part. Moreover his hasty command for the abrupt end of the Senator’s meeting showed just who yielded the greatest political muscle in the room.

I advise everyone to listen to the audio track and make up your own mind as to just how broken the political scene is here in Central New York. What other projects have failed to abide by the letter of the law that the rest of us taxpayers are mandated to abide by? It should foster some thought as to how much taxpayer money has been diverted to private pockets in the past under the guise of the job retention.

Thanks for the audio, it was extremely interesting. It's almost comical that the "players" involved with this fiasco claim that they held a public hearing on the construction of an intersection. It never happened! At least as required by NYS law. I won't bore everybody by reciting the requirements set forth in the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA), but suffice it to say the lead agency (T/O New Hartford) has not even come close to being compliant with SEQRA. And everybody at DOT knows it because they struggle with complying with SEQRA everyday when it comes to their State Highway projects. How in the world could the Town, State, Developer or anybody give assurances to The Hartford that the intersection will be built before the SEQRA requirements have been met. Unbelieveable! Don't the Town and State realize they are opening themselves up to litigation and place taxpayers at risk of funding a defense against the inevitable law suits????

The fact of the matter is that there will be perhaps dozens of people who attend the public hearing that are opposed to the intersection and very few people in favor. The controversy associated with this project is obvious. Controversial projects require deeper evaluation according to SEQRA. Let's see how the Town and State react to the valid concerns that will be raised at the hearing. I am hopeful that in the end they will do the right thing despite all the mistakes that have been made up to this point.

I just finished listening to the audiotape of the emergency meeting and couldn't believe my ears.I am one of the few people who actually owns propertyon Rte. 840. We were told when the were putting theroad thru our property that we couldn't have accessto the road because it was limited access. How is itthat Larry Adler and his many millions gets to haveaccess on a limited access road. Also, how is itthat the DOT can give a gauratee with out even seeingthe Supplemental EIS? Mr. Sharma has a good working relationship with the Army COE so I guessthey get to fill in more Federal Wetlands . Haven'tthey done enough damage to the local wetlandswith this road? Environmental impact statementsare exactly that, impact statements, they don't even how this will affect the wetlands, animals etc.but they are going ahead anyway. How sad. We are all going green except when its not convenient especially for the DOT and Mr. Adler. They get to do what ever to the environment.